Can Religious Belief In God Be Epistemically Warranted?

Can religious belief in God be epistemically warranted? With no surprise, belief in God is something that has always been a debatable issue for many people. It is questionable to believe if God really truly exists because of the lack of proof or underlying grounds to support this belief. Although Christians believe that God does exist, other people may have differing views. Alvin Plantinga is a famous, Christian philosopher who has provided us with reasons for God’s existence. His religious beliefs infringe on those beliefs of the new atheists, or those that do not believe in God’s existence. Plantinga rejects the evidentialist challenge, the view that religious belief must be upheld by evidence in order to be realistic, and offers the proposal

This argument draws upon reformed epistemology. Reformed epistemology is a proposal that declines the evidentialist challenge. It is an approach that defends religious belief by arguing that it is similar to perceptual belief. Both of these beliefs relate to the same epistemic standard. In the evidentialist challenge, perceptual belief is not predominating, so religious belief is rationally held and contributes to knowledge. This proposal refers to a sense of divinity, known as the sensus divinitatis. Our sensus divinitatis makes it possible for a religious believer to gain religious belief, rationally held religious belief and religious knowledge in a reliable way. There are several premises that support this

Everyone relies on their perceptual beliefs to form beliefs about the world around us, but not everyone has religious beliefs. “If a religious believer can appeal to a sensus divintatis to explain how they have rationally held religious belief and religious knowledge, then surely anyone can make a similar move to defend their unusual mystical beliefs” (Pritchard, 2014, p.140) This is known as the ‘Great Pumpkin’ problem. Being reliant on perceptual beliefs might cause someone to think that it is a basic source of knowledge as well as a rational belief. This idea does not relate to the same epistemic standards as other sources. However, religious belief is something that many people can do without. So, since religious beliefs are not a basic source of knowledge like perception, then religious beliefs should be held to a higher epistemic